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The conventional knock on Lennon's later recordings -- after five years of retirement as a househusband helping raise baby Sean in the confines of the Dakota -- is that it was too soft and fuzzy. Perhaps inevitably, under the pressure of being one of pop music's all-time highest-profile comebacks, some were disappointed by the conservative sound of 1980's "Double Fantasy." But set in the context of his full solo career, these songs take on more layers. "I'm Losing You" (especially this biting version, recorded during an aborted session with Cheap Trick providing the backing) is hardly the kind of dozy, lovesick musing that critics of this era would have you believe. I've always found the lyrics to "Woman" rather clunky, but to deny the melodic pleasures of "(Just Like) Starting Over" -- leaving aside the sentimentality that comes from remembering it all over the radio in the days after his murder -- is to ignore Lennon's first love, old-school rock and roll.

In fact, as much of a mess as 1975's oldies tribute "Rock & Roll" turned out to be (recorded in a drunken haze with an out-of-tune band, many of the sessions helmed by an out-of-control Phil Spector), it's the lone Lennon album that's under-represented on "Working Class Hero." Only his version of Ben E. King's "Stand by Me" is included. One thing to remember about John Lennon is that, even on his worst day, even at his lowest physical and mental conditions, he might have been the greatest pure singer in rock history. The raggedy live rendition of "Come Together" tossed into this mix, in which he nervously struggles for the words, illustrates his ability to ace a vocal regardless of the circumstances (see also "This Boy" from the Beatles' Ed Sullivan appearances, or "All You Need is Love," or even the demo recording of "Real Love").

The two songs from the generally reviled "Some Time in New York City" (which is finally being released on CD, minus the interminable live jam with Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention) display some of Lennon's worst artistic tendencies -- topical lyrics that were dated by the time they hit stores and sloppy and inconsequential arrangements -- but they too have to be part of the story. John Lennon was a curious blend of ambition and improvisation. He shot from the hip ("[The Beatles] are more popular than Jesus") but was well aware of his influence. If he embraced something -- primal scream therapy, radical politics, child-rearing -- he took it on 100 percent, until the next thing presented itself. But he was never disingenuous, in his life or his music, even when it led to disastrous missteps.

This is where Cynthia Lennon's new book, "John" can add to our understanding of this overanalyzed legend. She tells the story of John as a broken man, who never recovered from the series of deaths -- his mother, his best friend Stuart Sutcliffe, Beatles' manager Brian Epstein -- that defined his young life. The towering figure in his youth is the woman who raised him, his stern, selfish Aunt Mimi. Cynthia describes someone who would always walk away from a relationship than risk dealing with complications or confrontation. It's hardly a pleasant portrait, but it's told without malice, and it feels compatible with the body of work he left behind.

The most revelatory new Lennon project, though, is the two DVDs of "The Dick Cavett Show: John & Yoko Collection." The first show -- a full hour that ran on September 11, 1971 -- was his first TV appearance since the break up of the Beatles, and it's quite a strange, fascinating document. John sports an army jacket and cowboy boots, and he fidgets and chews gum throughout. Yoko wears something best described as an orange hot-pantsuit (it's super hot). They smoke and hold hands off-and-on throughout the interview.

Cavett, meantime, assumes an air of detached amusement and leads an amazing stop-and-start parry-and-thrust with the couple. They trade wordplay, discuss John's favorite illustrators and read instructions from Yoko's book "Grapefruit." Clips are shown from experimental films by both Lennons, and they screen music videos for songs from both of their new albums. Yoko is treated as John's creative equal, and the obvious understanding to stay away from Beatles questions is honored. And somehow, out of this odd rhythm, John loosens up and lets Cavett in.

They get around to Beatles stuff without making a big show of it, though Lennon says "I'm fed up talking about the Beatles." The much-celebrated sassiness and humor come through spontaneously, with more than a little edge. Even some of the kookier notions -- the merits of bag-ism, or Cavett listening to Lennon's forehead through a stethoscope, all in the name of "total communication" -- feel sincere, but not overly earnest. You like this couple, in a way that a more conventional, more rehearsed appearance would never allow you to feel.

In their two subsequent appearances, John and Yoko aren't on for the show's full hour, but the exchanges get even looser. Cavett and Lennon even turn a bit confrontational with each other, in a good-hearted way, with seemingly mutual intellectual respect. It all adds up to a John that was seldom chronicled; unlike the rightfully renowned Rolling Stone and Playboy magazine interviews (where he was cranked up and ready to unload) or the freak show of the Lennons' appearances on "The Mike Douglas Show," here he's a regular guy -- or at least as regular as a guy who would later be voted one of the Top Ten Britons of All Time could be. "You're always held up to what you said before," he tells Cavett, "and half the time you don't even know what you're talking about."

It's vaguely ridiculous to talk about the impact or legacy of John Lennon. Quite simply, the Beatles defined the very concept of the modern band, and everyone who has made music since owes them some kind of debt. Confessional singer-songwriters, rappers writing street reportage, bleeding-heart emo bands -- none of them would be the same without the ground broken by the Fab Four. The group's recordings approach perfection (and as the father of a Beatles-obsessed 2-year-old, I can attest to the fact that no matter how well you think you know these records, they hold up miraculously well to frequent repetition). Lennon's post-Beatles years, too, stand as a beacon for living a principled public life as a husband and father, a musician and an activist.

Make no mistake: That decade was a mess, too. Drugs, alcohol, infidelity, an abandoned wife and son and a lot of unfocused, slipshod music take up a good part of Lennon's latter life. But from "Cold Turkey" to "Watching the Wheels," he was brave enough to put all of his life into his art. (It's interesting to note that even the most scandalous moment in Cynthia Lennon's book -- the one time that John punched her in a foolish, jealous rage -- is blunted by his lines from "Getting Better" several years later: "I used to be cruel to my woman/I'd beat her and keep her apart from the things that she loved."

It's tempting to think about what Lennon would be doing today. At 65, would he be touring regularly like Dylan, or occasionally and at great profit, like the Rolling Stones and his former writing partner? Would he be leading anti-war protests or serving as an international man of letters? But nothing is to be gained from such speculation. Above all else, Lennon was unpredictable, so who's to say where his life would have taken him? And, sadly, why even bother in the face of his tragic, brutally final end?

"I could still be forgotten when I'm dead," Lennon said to Dick Cavett on that first broadcast. "I don't really care what happens when I'm dead." This was, of course, simultaneously completely true and utterly false. One foot squarely planted in the moment and one striding toward the future, like in "Revolution" where he sang "don't you know that you can count me out/in." No one has ever juggled publicity and privacy, truth and bullshit, art and life the way John Lennon did. It's why there's never been anyone else like him, and why he'll never be forgotten.

Alan Light is the former editor-in-chief of Spin, Vibe, and Tracks magazines, and a former Senior Writer at Rolling Stone. His writing has also appeared in the New York Times, the New Yorker, GQ, and Entertainment Weekly, and his book "The Skills to Pay the Bills: The Story of the Beastie Boys" will be published in January, 2006. Alan is a two-time winner of the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for excellence in music writing.